The sport of rock climbing has expanded significantly since the early 1970's with the introduction of various pieces of passive protection which can be placed into the cracks of a rock face and which permit climbers to safely ascend a rock face without defacing or destroying the rock face. As should be understood, in the sport of rock climbing, climbers typically rely on dynamic ropes to advance up a rock face. These particular ropes protect them against falls and allow them to move their climbing gear along a pitch as they climb. These ropes which secure the climber and/or gear of the climber are removably secured to the rocks through the use of various anchoring devices or what is termed above “passive protection.” These various anchoring devices are operable to be coupled with carabineers, webbing straps, and other devices in order to assist the climb. Anchoring devices have heretofore been of two types, those which are permanently emplaced or fixed on the rock face, and those that are removable.
In recent times, fixed anchoring apparatus or devices such as pitons and hangers of various types have become disfavored in many popular rock climbing sites. As a general matter, these have become disfavored because of the damage done to the rock face when placing these devices. Still further, these devices often project dangerously from the rock face, they rust, and they can often break off and leave sharp remnants. Still further, pitons for example have become disfavored because they are quite heavy and they are often cannot be removed once they have been placed, thus necessitating a costly replacement. In addition to the foregoing, severe accidents have occurred in the past when later climbers have relied upon previously placed pitons only to discover that they cannot sustain a dynamic fall. Moreover, the placement of pitons in rock faces which experience high erosion have caused cracks or fissures to develop in the rock faces.
Because of the many perceived disadvantages of fixed anchors (pitons and hangers) and the trend toward clean climbing, various readily deployable and removable anchors have been developed. The prior art is replete with numerous examples of active and passive chocks and removable anchors. In this regard, active chocks have one or more moving parts while passive chocks have no moving parts. Chocks which are commonly called “nuts” are used by forcing them into a crack. These devices then act in a tortional fashion in the crack. Still further, various anchors having a plurality of spring biased camming elements have been developed and which are operable to be placed in a crack of a rock and which, when expanded, can resist the fall of a climber.
Examples of various spring loaded camming devices of this type are exemplified by the following U.S. Pat. Nos.: 4,184,657; 4,781,346; 4,645,149; 4,643,377; 4,586,686; 4,565,342; 4,575,032; 4,712,754; 4,832,289; 4,923,160; 5,860,629; 6,042,069; 6,375,139; and U.S. Published applications: 2002/0162927 and 2003/0057337. The teachings of these references are incorporated by reference herein.
In use, the prior art devices, as described above, are, typically anchored in natural cracks or crevices formed in a rock wall. These cracks of course are of widely varying shapes and sizes. In order to allow secure placement of a camming device of these designs, it is advantageous to have a camming head or portion which is not only adjustable to fit the cracks of varying widths, but which is otherwise as axially compact as possible. More specifically, the compactness of such devices allows its use in some difficult crack placements where prior art devices sized to fit cracks of similar widths might not be useable. Such difficult placements typically include cracks which are not straight, or which have other abnormalities which create difficulty in placing the spring loaded camming assembly in an appropriate location where it might withstand a load which is generated by a subsequent fall of a climber.
One of the typical difficulties in placing such pieces of protection relates to selecting the appropriate sized spring loaded climbing anchor for placement in cracks that have varying width. In view of the difficulties in selecting appropriate anchors, a rock climber will typically carry a range of different anchors having various sizes to fit into cracks of various widths. These several additional anchors increases the weight of the rack which the climber must carry and further increases the difficulty in selecting the appropriate anchor to fit the crack being considered. In view of the difficulty in selecting an appropriate anchor, a climber may attempt to place several differently sized anchors in the crack before finally selecting an appropriate one. Beyond the difficulty associated with carrying additional anchors, the handling and attempted placement, and then replacement of the anchor back on to climbers climbing harness or rack results in expenditure of additional time, and an increased likelihood that the anchor will be mishandled or otherwise dropped before it is reattached to the climber's body.
Therefore, the present invention relates to a climbing anchor having improved performance characteristics and which further addresses many of the perceived shortcomings attendant with the prior art climbing anchors of similar design.